Hi everyone,
I'm brand new here, and am just desperate for some help and support, even to just not feel alone!
My 6 year old son was diagnosed with SPD late last year. He did the SIPT earlier this year which identified modulation as his main problem area.
His current teacher does not seem to understand - or want to understand what SPD is, and has implied that she thinks something else is causing his poor concentration. I did tell her the educational psychologist we saw last year ruled out ADD, but I'm not sure it sank in.
At the moment our main issues are:
poor concentration
deteriorating behaviour as the week progresses - the teacher basically said from thursday, his school day is a write-off as he's not able to do anything.
This has been incredibly hard for me. First to accept that this is not just a minor little "thing" that I don't need to worry about, and then to watch my bright boy struggle in the classroom.
And this is where my other difficulty lies. He is always doing "fine" academically - the teachers can't fault him on his actual knowledge/school related skills, it seems that it's just that he doesn't focus in class, and this is a huge concern.
On the one hand, I realise that he needs to pay attention and carry out instructions.
On the other hand, having been told that he behaves perfectly on Mondays, which is when the teacher says she covers all new material for the week (Tues-Fri is spent revising, consolodating what they learnt on Monday), then I'm not sure why it's such a huge issue if he's not focussing so well on Thursdays? Especially as he's ahead both in reading, writing and maths/numeracy.
And herein lies my other question: does anyone have any experience with other SPD kids' behaving worse and worse as the week progresses? I'm not sure what to make of this? Is it related to being calm after a physically active weekend? Is it tied in to them only doing new work on Mondays - ie, is it maybe not SPD affecting him later in the week, but boredom after doing 2 or 3 days of revision?
He was in an awesome creche from 2-4 years old, and could reliably identify 3 letters at 2.5years old. He could count to 20 by 3, and was working out sums (17 + 3 = 20) just after he turned 4. In South Africa, where we live, the school curriculum only covers these things from Grade R / Kindergarten year. While I think there's enough other new material (life skills, general sciences, etc) to keep him interested, I am concerned that the constant revision of concepts he knew years ago could be boring him?
I only think he gained an advantage through a great foundation here - while he's "bright", he's not reciting poetry, playing the violin like Paganini or doing square roots
I think I better stop here.
I have SO many questions but will try search through other posts before asking.
But if anyone has any ideas or advice about any of the above, please let me know?
Many thanks!
